


Sleeping Soundly

by littlelamblittlelamb



Category: The Charioteer - Mary Renault
Genre: M/M
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2014-12-06
Updated: 2014-12-06
Packaged: 2018-02-28 08:37:02
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,152
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/2725823
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/littlelamblittlelamb/pseuds/littlelamblittlelamb
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Alec isn't heartless, but he isn't selfless either. Not enough to keep him awake at night.</p>
            </blockquote>





	Sleeping Soundly

**Author's Note:**

> It's been a while since I read 'The Charioteer'. Any misgivings can be attributed to that. Pre-Charioteer, Alec and Sandy in an established relationship, but Alec having some Ralph on the side.

Alec wouldn’t do it if he didn’t want to – he has always been a little selfish. Not in the normal sense; he knows how to share and to give kindnesses. It is only that Alec enjoys niceties. No, his selfishness is a different sort – harmless almost. That he’s lying beside Ralph Lanyon at the present might be an example of such unique selfishness. That Sandy is at home – their home, as he takes pleasure in telling everyone – under the impression that Alec Deacon is terribly late and could be anywhere, well. Perhaps Alec is a little cruel as well.

“That was him at Donald’s party, wasn’t it? I didn’t say hello, but I don’t suppose a good deal of men go around introducing themselves as Sandy, do they? But I wasn’t sure what to make of him.” Ralph says it all as though discussing a pup in a window, trying to figure out whether it is diseased.

Alec shrugs. “Make of him what you will.”

Ralph only snorts. “I’m afraid I have already. He seems quite keen, doesn’t he? About you. It’s funny to watch. He flitters about, but when it’s you…” Ralph grins to himself. “When it’s you, it’s like God is speaking to him. And he’ll get so excited that he’ll get caught up, speak over you, and then apologise immediately.”

A poorly bred pup, apparently.

“He’s not unkind.” Sandy isn’t altogether handsome, but Alec likes his features, however nature decided to suture them all together. The fair hair and blue eyes and soft skin – Alec finds it a certain amount endearing. Harmless would be the word, if he ever fished for it. Ralph is a wolf or a lion; a predator. Sandy is a deer or lamb.

“Well of course he isn’t.” Ralph grins again, this time wickedly. He’s quite drunk – Alec not quite as much – and that grin is a precursor for something horrible. Perhaps it is an indicator of Alec’s nature that he doesn’t stop him from saying, “Tell me, Alec, is it a medical marvel that he’s able to walk upright without even a trace of a spine?”

“You’re a bastard, Ralph.” But it isn’t said acidly or with any harshness, and Ralph chuckles.

“Why have you decided to keep him, Alec? You could do better – and I’m not saying me, either. I mean other men who aren’t quite so… you know.”

Alec feels the rumbling of guilt go through him. He knows that Sandy is less than him – not for a moment has he considered them equals. When Alec had taken Sandy to bed for the first time, Sandy had acted entirely airheaded – quite a ditz, really. At the end he had told Alec that he isn’t as stupid as he seems. Alec had agreed with him – Of course not. You’re studying to be a doctor, same as me – and Sandy had lit up. It strikes Alec that Sandy hasn’t at all been looking in the right places for his bedfellows. Sandy’s giddy, effeminate affectations both repulse and act as a siren for men who are bound to pick him up and throw him away. Men rather like Ralph, but stripped of his good graces.

“He doesn’t understand our lot the way we do. He had all sisters,” is what Alec ends up saying. It does explain something of Sandy’s interactions with men, and his expectations of them – expectations which will never be met. It occurs to him that at this point he isn’t defending Sandy’s honour so much as dissecting him.

“Hmmm, Christ. He expects you to marry him, then? He must be very disappointed.” But Ralph looks a touch more serious than he did before.

“I think he is, rather. He cooks and cleans and does all the other wifely duties. I think he expects me to make an honest woman of him.” He usually thinks nothing of it when the dishes seem magically done. He feels tired at the end of the day, and it only occasionally occurs to him that Sandy is probably subject to a similar fatigue. Alec never pretends around Sandy – not unless he’s being hysterical, anyway. With Ralph, he had always been reasonable, and when he found it tiresome, he’d try all the harder. With Sandy it’s different. He finds himself being grumpy or annoyed and not trying to contain it in the slightest. Usually Sandy will perk up and try to soothe Alec. Ralph was not insensitive, but blunt. A bad day? Me too; let’s fuck.

Sandy will make him coffee or cocoa. Neither? Something to take the edge off, then. He’ll use this light, breathy voice and gentle, unobtrusive hands to see if he wants to discuss it, as though to prise away Alec’s concerns. Do you want to talk about it? No? Are you sure? Just the hospital, I suppose then – I know. I know, Alec. It’s okay, I know what you need.

To his credit, he usually does. Alec has almost blurted that out to Ralph a few times. Sandy isn’t a bad lover. He’s pleasant, excitable, and certainly not lacking in enthusiasm. But perhaps that isn’t right – the best way to describe it would be accommodating (if Alec thinks about it a moment, he might consider that this makes him selfish, but it is a permitted sort of selfishness endorsed by Sandy himself). Sandy as a person is accommodating. He isn’t usually unfriendly to anyone, and he is usually quick to comply and agree with most people. Alec has seen how some people talk to Sandy – in a way Alec would consider highly inappropriate – but Sandy never says a word about it. No use starting pointless fights.

“I’d almost feel sorry for him, then,” says Ralph. Alec questions if he means it. Alec doesn’t feel pity for Bunny in the slightest. Nights like this with Ralph have certainly never incurred guilt on Bunny’s behalf. Apparently Ralph regards Sandy similarly. A part of Alec could defend him there – for all Sandy’s antics, the one he ends up hurting when he’s teetering on the edge is inevitably himself. A good portion of that is to guilt Alec but – well. Lying in the bed of Ralph Lanyon right now, and that of another in the same week, Alec has a good deal of guilt to feel. “I’m your friend, not his. And I cannot imagine a circumstance where I would befriend him – I beg your pardon Alec, but it could never be. I’m sure he has people fighting in his corner.”

This time Ralph doesn’t grin or laugh, but it’s the most deadly jibe of the night.

“Me, you mean?”

It’s dark out, and Alec won’t be going home to Sandy tonight. It would be as hard to justify how late he is if he left now as if he left in the morning, so it’s best to sleep. Sandy won’t sleep a wink.

“Goodnight, Alec.”


End file.
